James Speed

James Speed (11 March 1812-25 June 1887) was US Attorney General from 2 December 1864 to 22 July 1866, succeeding Edward Bates and preceding Henry Stanbery.

Biography
James Speed was born in Jefferson County, Kentucky in 1812, the brother of Joshua Fry Speed. In 1833, he was admitted to the bar in Louisville, and, in 1841, he lent Abraham Lincoln books from his law library. Unlike his brother Joshua, he opposed slavery and was active in the Whig Party, being elected to the State House in 1847. He later served on the Louisville Board of Aldermen and as a professor at the University of Louisville, and he worked to keep his state in the union as the American Civil War approached. In 1862, as a State Senator, he introduced a controversial bill to confiscate Confederate property in his state. In 1864, he became Attorney General in President Abraham Lincoln's cabinet, and, after Lincoln's assassination, he became a supporter of the Radical Republicans and advocated for male African-Americans to have the right to vote. In 1866, disillusioned with the conservative policies of President Andrew Johnson, he resigned from the Cabinet. He failed in his bids to serve as Vice President and in the US House of Representatives, and he died in 1887.